The news on the irradiated beef front has gotten worse. Since John's article, they have discovered that cows with even higher (much higher) radiation levels made it to market. So far, the numbers of cows discovered is still small, so not too many people could have been exposed. We did not consume any Japanese beef at our house, but there is always school lunches to consider. The schools are sending out detailed lists of where their food comes from now, but the beef story is still new. The gov't and media are currently tracking where the final destinations of these cows were.

The maddening thing is that the farms sold the beef anyway. Now that these one or two farmer are being questioned, they admit they fed the cows feed that had been left outside during the worst of the radiation, even though they had been informed not to, because they said they had no other options, but then they willingly sold the beef when anyone who had any sense would have asked that the beef be tested before it was sold further down the line. The only real way to check meat is to kill the animal first which is usually done far away from the farms, which is why there is a delay. My wife blames the government for unclear guidelines but is more pissed at the people who sold this beef and the initial buyers who knew exactly where the beef came from and sold it anyway, knowing there was a high possibility of it irradiating people, but doing it because they could get away with it. I am sure the farms needed the money but there are more things than money.

Again, for the first time in a while, the Japanese news is ahead. I can't find any news about the second farm which sold more cows at higher radiation levels than the farm mentioned in John's link. I saw it on the news last night though. The first story was cows with 5-6 times the set limit of radiation. The one I heard last night was in the 50-60 times range. Yes, scary.

This is why I hate getting news only in Japanese. When I was listening to the news last night, I assumed they were talking about the actual beef levels. The 50-60 times the limit was about the hay the cows were fed, which just as in the other farm's case, would mean the actual level in the cows' meat will be lower, likely 5-6 times the limit. Still bad, but less scary. Japan is not a big beef consumer anyway, and also imports a lot because Japanese beef is too expensive. Will check my accuracy next time before I start typing away next time.

Yep, the irradiated beef fiasco continues to balloon. We have confirmed that the son doesn't get much beef in his school lunch. Not sure how much I have consumed outside of the home. I am a bit of a McDonald's fan (sorry) and eat there about once a week, but all the beef there is American or maybe Australian. This is a real f-up by the gov't etc. They are taking steps now but those 500 and counting cows have largely already been consumed.

The cesium flavored beef thing continued to balloon. It seems the reason was largely because the "hay" (which is actually rice hay) that these cows were fed largely came from Miyagi, just north of the plant and the hay was left outside during the worst of the crisis, but was still sent to farms all over that area of Japan. The cows fed it were in turn shipped to every prefecture in Japan except for Okinawa. They say eating one kilo of beef from the average cow in this fiasco would give one about as much rad exposure as an pan-Pacific flight. Again, this largely ignores the internalization of particles that does not occur in X-rays and plane flights but oh well.

The government, again moving slower than irradiated molasses has just decided to start buying up any remaining possibly irradiated beef from all over Japan (just heard this this morning) and charging it to TEPCO.

In other, more heartening news, a few smaller earthquakes later, the damaged plant buildings and the Northeastern region itself seem to be holding up well. The current radioactive emissions from the plant itself are down to 1/2,000,000 of what they were at it's height. Encouraging, but scary if you consider at one point it was 2,000,000 times higher. I assume that means if all goes well (which OF COURSE it will will will) that Daiichi will never come close to reaching Chernobyl's emissions.

Another piece of info I have heard (by the same radionuclide expert I mentioned in another thread an hour or two ago) is that his office believes that, according to analysis of the thermal output of Daiichi, that the amount of radiation was 20 times that put out by the Hiroshima A-Bomb. That's right, 20. Sobering stuff. Haven't heard anyone try to debunk this guy yet. He knows what he is talking about.

Probably should give links, and not just my takes on it. Here is the expert talking to the panel. If English captions don't come on, click the CC box in the bottom right part of the video box. If you don't want to hear it all, fast forward to 1:52 where he talks about long lasting radiation. Puts my stomach in knots, it really does.

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